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...in the episodes featuring the various themes prominently list the composers, 'Zoneboy'. Cahn and Van Heusen during the first three seasons [different orchestrations in each season, 'stevea']; Greenfield and Keller in seasons four and five. The website classicthemes.com also documents this in full...

Based on all three sets of DVDS and what I've seen on Youtube, here's what I have been able to account for in the way of "Hazel" openings:

1. Season one: Hazel gets cookies out of the oven, everyone else follows the smell back to the kitchen. (The only one from the Ford years that doesn't show a Ford.) There's one version of this one in color for the special 1961 color episode, and that color one was reused for the season premiere of Season Two.

2. Later in Season one, everyone's getting out of the family car (a 1962 Ford Country Squire station wagon) and Hazel comes out to greet them.

3. Season Two starts off with Hazel sitting, homecoming-queen style, on top of the back seat of a red 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 convertible. George laughs, and beckons Mrs. B. to come look. Harold, wearing a football uniform but no helmet, is sitting in a tree throwing confetti. Then the rest of a football team is seen cheering around the car, which has a poster on the door that says "Our Coach."

4. Later in Season Two, Hazel arrives home with groceries in the aforementioned '63 Ford convertible. The family, even Smiley, takes turns helping Hazel with the groceries, and she has nothing but the newspaper to bring in.

5. In what appears to be one-time-only use, in the Season Three season premiere, the Baxters are getting ready to get their picture made in front of a red 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 XL (this time it's a hardtop with a black vinyl top). Hazel sets the timer on the camera and joins George, Dorothy and Harold next to the car.

6. The main Season Three opening: Hazel gets behind the wheel of the car. One by one, everyone else gets in, with George and Dorothy taking the back seat and Harold and Smiley riding shotgun. Then the car, a 1964 Ford Galaxie 500 XL, red, leaves frontways out of the driveway and drives off stage left.

7. The season finale of Season Three shows Hazel driving up in the family's new red Mustang (quite possibly one of the first ever shown on television, outside a commercial or news footage). Harold, playing a pretend toll booth operator, collects change from Hazel. George, in the front yard with garden shears, motions for Dorothy to come look, which she does. Harold lifts the pretend tollgate and Hazel drives the Mustang into the driveway, in a shot that looks like it could've come from a Ford commercial.

8. There's a Season four opening on Youtube in which George and Dorothy want to know where the keys are to their 1965 Ford Galaxie 500 hardtop (blue with a black vinyl top). Apparently Harold was using them in his Thunderbird lookalike kiddie car. There's new theme music that I specifically also remembering hearing on "The Flintstones" (another Screen Gems production, and no it's not the iconic Flintstones main theme).

9. The season five opening where Hazel tries to hand out raincoats to her new family plus Harold, is on Youtube. It has all new music that was likely used more in syndication that it ever was on CBS.

10. There's a syndicated opening that I saw for years on TBS, that's a bizarre mashup of some of the above. It shows Hazel getting groceries out of the car, then George laughs and calls for Dorothy, who then waves, then Harold throws confetti from the tree. We see Hazel slipping into the house, inexplicably now holding raincoats instead of groceries. The whole time we're hearing the season five theme which cuts off abruptly. This is also on Youtube, minus the closing shot with the raincoats.

I haven't seen the one where they're passing around the telephone yet, but I'll take everyone's word for it. I wouldn't be surprised to know of at least one more Season Four opening.

Based on all three sets of DVDS and what I've seen on Youtube, here's what I have been able to account for in the way of "Hazel" openings:

1. Season one: Hazel gets cookies out of the oven, everyone else follows the smell back to the kitchen. (The only one from the Ford years that doesn't show a Ford.) There's one version of this one in color for the special 1961 color episode, and that color one was reused for the season premiere of Season Two.

2. Later in Season one, everyone's getting out of the family car (a 1962 Ford Country Squire station wagon) and Hazel comes out to greet them.

3. Season Two starts off with Hazel sitting, homecoming-queen style, on top of the back seat of a red 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 convertible. George laughs, and beckons Mrs. B. to come look. Harold, wearing a football uniform but no helmet, is sitting in a tree throwing confetti. Then the rest of a football team is seen cheering around the car, which has a poster on the door that says "Our Coach."

4. Later in Season Two, Hazel arrives home with groceries in the aforementioned '63 Ford convertible. The family, even Smiley, takes turns helping Hazel with the groceries, and she has nothing but the newspaper to bring in.

5. In what appears to be one-time-only use, in the Season Three season premiere, the Baxters are getting ready to get their picture made in front of a red 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 XL (this time it's a hardtop with a black vinyl top). Hazel sets the timer on the camera and joins George, Dorothy and Harold next to the car.

6. The main Season Three opening: Hazel gets behind the wheel of the car. One by one, everyone else gets in, with George and Dorothy taking the back seat and Harold and Smiley riding shotgun. Then the car, a 1964 Ford Galaxie 500 XL, red, leaves frontways out of the driveway and drives off stage left.

7. The season finale of Season Three shows Hazel driving up in the family's new red Mustang (quite possibly one of the first ever shown on television, outside a commercial or news footage). Harold, playing a pretend toll booth operator, collects change from Hazel. George, in the front yard with garden shears, motions for Dorothy to come look, which she does. Harold lifts the pretend tollgate and Hazel drives the Mustang into the driveway, in a shot that looks like it could've come from a Ford commercial.

8. There's a Season four opening on Youtube in which George and Dorothy want to know where the keys are to their 1965 Ford Galaxie 500 hardtop (blue with a black vinyl top). Apparently Harold was using them in his Thunderbird lookalike kiddie car. There's new theme music that I specifically also remembering hearing on "The Flintstones" (another Screen Gems production, and no it's not the iconic Flintstones main theme).

9. The season five opening where Hazel tries to hand out raincoats to her new family plus Harold, is on Youtube. It has all new music that was likely used more in syndication that it ever was on CBS.

10. There's a syndicated opening that I saw for years on TBS, that's a bizarre mashup of some of the above. It shows Hazel getting groceries out of the car, then George laughs and calls for Dorothy, who then waves, then Harold throws confetti from the tree. We see Hazel slipping into the house, inexplicably now holding raincoats instead of groceries. The whole time we're hearing the season five theme which cuts off abruptly. This is also on Youtube, minus the closing shot with the raincoats.

I haven't seen the one where they're passing around the telephone yet, but I'll take everyone's word for it. I wouldn't be surprised to know of at least one more Season Four opening.

In the mash-up syndication opener for S1-S4:

Hazel unloading the groceries is from S2, Opening 2; George calling Dorothy to the door, up to the confetti throw, is S2, Opening 1; Hazel sneaking into the house with the raincoats is S5, Opening 2. That way, there's absolutely no trace of any identifiable Ford product (unless you know what the inside of the '63 Galaxie 500/XL convertible looked like).

There was at least one other S5 opener besides the "Umbrella/Downpour" used in the montage of openings: The one where Hazel, then Steve, then Barbara. then Susie, then Harold are all talking with the invisible George and Dorothy from Saudi Arabia. Both of them contain the phrases "INTRODUCING RAY FULMER" and 'INTRODUCING LYNN BORDEN."

(Incidentally, the photo-taking opening from S3--the one that shows the "scatback" 500/XL 2-door hardtop--first appeared in early 1963, when Ford launched the new hardtop, plus the Monte Carlo Thunderbird, Fairlane 500 sport coupe hardtop, and Falcon Sprint hardtop as their "'63 1/2" models. The same opening was used when Screen Gems dubbed "Hazel" into French for the Canadian market. The title character, by the way, was renamed "Adele" for French-Canadian consumption!)

Great Job Dwayne with the opening descriptions. I am now on season 4. The season opening where Hazel hurries in to the photo session . Whitney hair is different in the new episodes . I guess a new haircut going into season 4.

1. Season One: Hazel gets cookies out of the oven, everyone else follows the smell back to the kitchen (the only one from the Ford years that doesn't show a Ford) . . . There's one version of this one in color for the special 1961 color episode, and that color one was reused for the season premiere of Season Two . . . I haven't seen the one where they're passing around the telephone yet, but I'll take everyone's word for it. I wouldn't be surprised to know of at least one more Season Four opening.

Your assumption about "not being surprised to know of at least one more" opening sequence of Hazel was semi-correct, except the one I recall is an additional opening for the very first episode ("Hazel's Cousin") of Season Two, which you referenced, but incorrectly, as it was not the exact same one as the special color opening for Episode Six of Season One titled "What'll We Watch Tonight?" It is the same basic opening (the one with "Baxter" family maid "Hazel Burke" removing fresh-baked cookies from the oven) used in the first half of Season One, most identical with that special color episode's opening, except where "Harold Baxter" (Bobby Buntrock) would usually double back and run stage right from the patio into the "Baxter" house after having smelled the cookies "Hazel" just baked, "Harold" ran off stage left.

This used-one-time opening sequence of Hazel also made no sense, since why would "Harold" have run away from the smell of the cookies? But perhaps the patio door was locked behind "Harold" and he was merely running around the house to get back in through the unlocked front door or to ring the doorbell to gain reentry? I guess we'll never know for sure. But one would assume "Sport" (the nickname "Hazel" called "Harold") would never have run away from his best friend's (the family maid's) fresh-baked cookies.

Last edited by jimmo : 07-30-2017 at 09:19 AM.
Reason: Rewritten to improve

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